No. 1 Indiana bounces back with big road win

COLUMBUS, Ohio — The top-ranked Indiana men’s basketball team showed it still has some gas in its tank on Sunday.

Victor Oladipo scored a career-high 26 points, Cody Zeller added 24 and Christian Watford 20 to lead Indiana back from a demoralizing loss to Illinois to a huge road win in beating No. 10 Ohio State 81-68 on Sunday.

The Hoosiers (21-3, 9-2 Big Ten), who dominated the second half, were coming off a stunning collapse that might have caused the undoing of many teams.

On Thursday night at Illinois, the Illini went on a 13-2 run to close the game, with Indiana turning the ball over late and then allowing an uncontested layup at the buzzer of a 74-72 shocker for the Hoosiers.

Less than three days later, they more than rebounded with a signature win in hostile territory.

The victory was Indiana’s first against a top-10 conference opponent in more than 20 years — since a win in 1993 at Iowa.

It was also the Hoosiers’ first win against any team in the top 10 rankings on the road since beating Notre Dame in 2000.

Deshaun Thomas, the Big Ten’s leading scorer and an Indiana native, had 26 points for Ohio State (17-6, 7-4), which dropped two games back of the Big Ten leaders with seven games left.

■ No. 4 Duke 62, Boston College 61: In Boston, Mason Plumlee had 19 points and 10 rebounds, hitting the game-winning free throw with 26 seconds left to help Duke rally from early and late deficits to beat Boston College.

Seth Curry added 18 points for the Blue Devils (21-2, 8-2 Atlantic Coast Conference), who watched the three teams above them in the AP Top 25 lose to unranked opponents this week — and then nearly joined them.

Duke won its fifth straight game.

Olivier Hanlan scored 20 points for Boston College (10-13, 2-8). The Eagles led by five points with 2:15 left and had a chance to win it after Plumlee made one of two free throws but Hanlan’s jumper was wide and the rebound popped out of bounds as the buzzer sounded to end the game.

■ California 77, No. 7 Arizona 69: In Tucson, Ariz., Allen Crabbe scored 19 of his 31 points in the second half, Justin Cobbs hit a big shot in the closing seconds and Cal held its composure down the stretch to beat Arizona.

Cal (14-9, 6-5 Pac-12) rallied from a 15-point deficit behind its defense against Arizona State on Thursday before coming up just short in a 66-62 loss. The Bears did the same thing to Arizona, keying a big run that put them up 10 with their zone.

Cal held on behind Crabbe and Cobbs, who scored on layup with 39 seconds left and had 21 points.

Mark Lyons had 16 points, Solomon Hill added 13 and Brandon Ashley 12 for the Wildcats (20-3, 8-3), who had 17 turnovers to end a five-game winning streak.

■ No. 9 Syracuse 77, St. John’s 58: In Syracuse, N.Y., James Southerland scored 13 points in his first appearance in seven games, and C.J. Fair had 17 points and nine rebounds to lead Syracuse past St. John’s.

It was the 37th straight win in the Carrier Dome for the Orange (20-3, 8-2 Big East), extending the nation’s longest active home streak in Division I.

The win also extended coach Jim Boeheim’s NCAA record for 20-win seasons to 35.

St. John’s coach Steve Lavin missed the game due to the overnight death of his 82-year-old father, Cap, leaving the reins to assistant coach Rico Hines.

Freshman JaKarr Sampson had 21 points to lead the Red Storm (15-9, 7-5).

■ Illinois 57, No. 18 Minnesota 53: In Minneapolis, Tyler Griffey capped a terrific week for Illinois with 16 points, and the Fighting Illini went 11 for 23 from 3-point range in a win over Minnesota.

Three days after Griffey’s buzzer-beating layup gave Illinois (17-8, 4-7) a 74-72 victory over top-ranked Indiana, Tracy Abrams swished a step-back 3-pointer with 18 seconds left to stretch the lead over Minnesota to four.

Austin Hollins had 16 points and four steals for the Golden Gophers (17-7, 5-6), who lost for the sixth time in eight games and could find themselves out of the Top 25, which is likely to be greatly shuffled after several upsets.